Thrombectomy count = 3
Awake craniotomy count = 2
Weather = a wet and cold 7 degrees! When it was mid twenties all last week!
13 people in theatre today observing the surgery, not including anyone who actually had a job to do, or the three people looking in through the theatre window. Excessive. One of the observers was another anaesthetist from Brazil. We had a chat about politics. He’s optimistic the new guy may get things on track after ten years of leftist governments have run the economy into the ground. OK….He did have a point about corruption, though – one of their most popular recent presidents, voted in twice, is currently in jail. We also had a long chat with the anaesthetic nurse, using google translate to go between English, French, and Portuguese. Actually, I’m not sure what app the nurse was using – it translated dura mater as long mother. How come we never get exotic visitors to theatre in Wellington? When the surgery was finished, the internationally renowned surgeon made a speech to everyone explaining what he had done, and how the surgeons who had done the patient’s last operation (ten years ago) were ignorant fools who didn’t know their anatomy. Nice.
Actually what I find most annoying about working here (apart from no milk in the staff room! Everyone has their coffee black) is the infection control procedures. I can’t go from theatres to radiology, a distance of 50 metres, without completely changing my scrubs, even though they use exactly the same scrubs in both places. Also, everyone still has to wear masks in theatre. On the other hand, the only way in or out of the operating room is through the electric double doors, so all during any case, whenever anyone in the cast of thousands wants in or out, the double doors open right up and waft all the germs in. Maybe French germs are different to ours back home?